A Prophet - Chapter 1 (Part 5)

Chapter 5 - Grandfather's Only "Leaked Setup"

After learning the Six-Word True Mantra, the new recruits often gathered together to discuss it, everyone rolling up their sleeves and itching to give it a try.

Yet Grandfather said, "Once you have learned the Six-Word True Mantra, you are not far from death."

This sentence left everyone dumbfounded. Grandfather explained, "Those who drown are always those who know how to swim. People without skills never dare to harbor thieving intentions; only those who have acquired skills dare to take desperate risks. Skill is a blessing, but it is also a curse. Therefore, having learned these things, you must be even more cautious when acting!"

Only then did everyone experience a sudden awakening. Indeed, before studying these things, everyone felt helpless and unsupported; having learned these things, it felt as if they had grasped a handle, always wanting to test it out immediately. Once the evil thought is generated, danger follows right behind it.

A higher-level secret, or rather, the sixth sense of a person.

Executing a scam yields high returns, but the risks are also great, because these targets are not ordinary roe deer—each one is craftier than the last. Making them act as the "target" is no easy feat. Sometimes a setup leaks—meaning someone "turns traitor," or a major "target" transforms into a major "jujube." At times like this, people usually die. As for who dies, it depends on the specific circumstances.

Grandfather was precisely the kind of person with the most acute intuition, and because of that, he saved his own life. That was Grandfather's only "leaked setup."

In the twenty-eighth year of the Republic, a high-ranking official from the Kuomintang Bureau of Investigation and Statistics came to the locality to supervise affairs. Kui Ye said this might be a major "target." As long as Grandfather personally took the field, he would surely rake in a massive sum.

Kui Ye was the local underworld boss. When the Kuomintang hunted down Communists, much of the intelligence was provided by him, and many dirty jobs were carried out by his subordinates.

Grandfather rarely took the field personally; only for high-ranking officials, wealthy matrons, or consortium chairmen would he act as the physiognomist himself.

Grandfather's "surface" was exceptionally good. "Surface" was local slang for appearance; Grandfather's eloquence was also highly refined. Only with his temperament and eloquence was he worthy of sitting at the grand table and executing major setups.

Grandfather's public identity was the direct descendant of the "Tieban Shendu," and newspapers mentioned him in the same breath as Wei Qianli. In reality, all of those connections had been bought off in advance.

Kui Ye had long associated with people from the Military Statistics Bureau and had even sworn a sworn-brother oath with a high-ranking official. The person targeted this time was none other than his sworn brother.

Kui Ye had long sensed that this sworn brother of his was deeply fatalistic, so he seized an opportunity to say to him, "There is a divination master locally who is extremely formidable, but very difficult to engage."

This high-ranking official then asked Kui Ye to help secure an appointment, but failing to secure one even after three consecutive attempts. This is known as playing hard to get.

Several months later, an appointment was finally secured, and they met at a teahouse. Prior to this, through Kui Ye's accounts, Grandfather already had complete mastery of this high-ranking official.

Grandfather first had him report his birth characters. Grandfather said, "When you were twenty-eight years old, you nearly became a ghost beneath a gun barrel."

The high-ranking official said, "True." "When you were twenty-nine, you were promoted." The high-ranking official said, "True." Grandfather said once more, "Your destiny holds three wives."

The high-ranking official said, "True."

Grandfather said, "Next year you will face a tribulation and lose your official position."

The high-ranking official said, "Oh?"

Grandfather said, "Follow my instructions, and I will adjust your feng shui for you."

Grandfather detailed precisely how he should adjust the feng shui layout. Finally, the high-ranking official grasped Grandfather's hand and said, "Master is truly a transcendent person!"

"Someone come." The high-ranking official had his subordinate bring over a box, and upon opening it, it was filled with thick stacks of banknotes. "Master has labored hard; please graciously accept this."

Grandfather smiled: "To be able to serve the Bureau Chief is already my humble self's utmost fortune; how would I dare to accept your wealth as well?" Having spoken, he left.

Grandfather's sixth sense was extremely acute. He felt something was amiss, so he temporarily altered his plan and accepted not a single cent.

On the way home, Grandfather discovered someone was tailing him. Without looking back, Grandfather strode directly home.

The moment he arrived home, he found four secret agents standing inside, their gun barrels instantly swinging toward him. "Come with us for a trip."

Grandfather was brought back to the bureau, and that bureau chief said with a sinister tone, "You thought you could fool me with this little trick?"

Grandfather asked with genuine puzzlement, "How so?"

The bureau chief said, "I casually dangled a bit of bait for you lot, and you swallowed the hook."

Grandfather instantly understood—this was a "jujube," and the information Kui Ye had leaked to him was fraudulent.

Grandfather said, "What do you mean?"

The bureau chief said, "That bastard Kui Er is a man who recognizes money rather than a father. From the day he introduced you to me, I grew suspicious. I knew he understood many things about me, so I intentionally fabricated a lie about almost being shot at age twenty-eight, but you happened to divine it precisely. Tell me, shouldn't you damn well die?"

Grandfather smiled: "The Bureau Chief is indeed brilliant; such an event truly occurred. Kui Er told me the Bureau Chief was coming to have his fortune told and asked me to be accurate. We fortune-tellers cannot guarantee every single detail will be accurate, so he said he would provide me with information and we would split the plundered money evenly. He is a man of the underworld, and we fortune-tellers dare not cross him, so we could only do as he said. However, Bureau Chief, I did not take a single cent. Because we fortune-tellers believe that good brings good rewards, and evil brings evil retribution."

The bureau chief smiled and said, "Very well then, divine for me right now. If your divination is accurate, I will let you go; if you calculate wrong, I'll blow your brains out right this instant!"

Grandfather half-closed his eyes, muttered incantations, and after a moment said calmly, "The Bureau Chief was born in this family, but raised in that family."

The bureau chief was startled. Grandfather said, "The ones who raised you were not your biological parents."

The bureau chief said, "You—continue divining."

Grandfather said, "To the south of your family's old residence, there should be a river or a pond, otherwise the Bureau Chief could never have become an official."

The bureau chief fell silent for a moment: "Go on." Grandfather said, "If the Bureau Chief does not say whether this is correct or wrong, I dare not continue."

The bureau chief had long since reined in his temper and said, "Correct, there was a pond, but later during a great drought, it dried up long ago."

Grandfather said, "That piece of feng shui was completely monopolized by the Bureau Chief. As the Bureau Chief rose to high office, the water naturally vanished."

The bureau chief chuckled heartily.

Everyone practicing the Abao trade knew the Six-Word True Mantra of scamming: "Examine, Knock, Strike, Cheat, Flatter, Sell." This was the "Flatter" formula within the Six-Word True Mantra—pushing adulation and flattery to the absolute limit. Flattery must be executed with precise appropriateness; otherwise, it is merely blind flattery. Grandfather's deployment of this "Flatter" tactic was extremely ingenious. Flattery must hit the precise mark, or else it is nothing more than blind adulation.

In the end, Grandfather returned safe and sound. Upon arriving home, his calves were drenched in sweat. He immediately summoned the regional bosses and announced: "The setup has leaked! Kui Er is a dead man! What we've offended this time is a secret police chieftain. Returning alive is a supreme stroke of luck; Kui Er will soon betray us. Quickly notify the brothers—all of you, scatter the pitches!"

"Scattering the pitches" meant disbanding, with everyone cutting contact with one another. No one was permitted to run pitches without orders. Everyone divided the money and went into hiding. Grandfather rushed back to the countryside overnight.

This scattering of the pitches lasted for an entire year, until the Japanese army invaded and the Kuomintang's primary battlefront retreated backward.

You will surely wonder: Why was he able to make accurate divinations at the final critical moment? Grandfather always left a fallback plan for everything. Earlier, when Kui Er provided him with information, he had dispatched several little feet to follow the clues provided by Kui Er, traveling nearly a thousand li to locate the bureau chief's ancestral home, meticulously recording the terrain and topography of his old residence. Those feet had even disguised themselves as chili pepper vendors, chatting idly with neighbors on the left and right to inquire about certain events from the bureau chief's childhood.

Kui Er never would have dreamed that Grandfather would leave a fallback plan, and the bureau chief even less so—never imagining that to execute a setup, Grandfather would spend two full months locating his ancestral home which he had been away from for over twenty years.

An acute sixth sense coupled with an eternal fallback plan was Grandfather's secret weapon for remaining undefeated after decades walking the Jianghu.

In the third year after entering the trade, I became a regional boss. Grandfather said, "Only people with a conscience can become regional bosses." He said my heart wasn't entirely dead yet, and in the future, I could take his position.

It is difficult for me to summarize Grandfather's personality in a few simple sentences. When he was ruthless, he killed without blinking an eye; when he was charitable, he was just like a Bodhisattva.

On ordinary days, Grandfather would relieve the poor—not in that superficial, dragonfly-skimming-the-water style of putting on an appearance, but through solid, substantive assistance. I do not know whether this was a remorse of conscience or a redemption of the soul.

Grandfather said the highest realm of being an Abao was to target only wicked people and evildoers. That old woman I hooked during my first time was not something an Abao should do; it was merely training, also called training the heart. If one dares to scam good people, one dares to scam wicked people even more.

In truth, I have always prayed for that old woman in my heart. Heaven opened its eyes; the following spring, her son actually returned, and soon the entire country was liberated. Later, Grandfather had me secretly stuff a large sum of money into the courtyard of the old woman's home. When stuffing the money, I felt as though I had found myself once again.

The sleep quality of those who work as Abao is never good, often waking up startled from nightmares. Sometimes they woke up laughing, and sometimes they woke up terrified. When there was no work, everyone drank desperately and visited brothels, but there was one rule: Abao must go outside their local area to play and could indulge to their heart's content, but they were strictly forbidden from showing up locally!

Because Abao ordinarily presented themselves to others with the utmost dignity and moral posture—especially the regional bosses, who all ran storefronts and sat in them every day looking sanctimonious—if they were seen in places of wine and brothels, it would spell catastrophic disaster.

When going out to play, they had to disguise themselves to varying degrees. This was no difficult task for Abao; everyone had several sets of outfits and a few fake mustaches, as scamming required disguises to begin with.

Going out to play was acceptable, but they must never "leak the wind." Leaking the wind meant running pitches directly in a foreign region or directly joining a foreign circle—this was a supreme taboo. In the twenty years since Grandfather took charge of this faction, not a single instance of "leaking the wind" had ever occurred.

Some feet went out to play and returned infected with venereal diseases, ultimately rotting away to death. Before dying, he said he wanted to see his parents, but Grandfather refused. Grandfather said, "If they see you in this dying state, they will also die of heartache."

After that foot died, Grandfather poured diesel fuel over him and burned him completely clean with a single fire. After his death, Grandfather dispatched people to send money to his family every month, claiming he was doing very well away from home, just too busy to return.

I asked Grandfather why he didn't set a rule prohibiting everyone from visiting prostitutes. Grandfather said, "Eating, drinking, and whoring are human nature. What are Abao gambling their lives for? If you suppress their human nature, it will sooner or later backlash. Only when they are well-fed, well-watered, and have whored to their heart's content will they have the strength to work."

At that moment, I felt how terrifying human nature truly is.